Archipelago 20.35 is the first unprecedentedly large Russian intensive course on formation and acceleration of teams that can create and commercialize projects in the realm of Artificial Intelligence (AI) for cutting-edge technological development in priority sectors of the economy and all spheres of public and social activity. It was divided in three stages: preaccelerating — selection programme; in fact, an intensive course, in which top 1000 teams with highest rating took part following the results of selection; and at the end, a final — presentation of results of «Archipelago 20.35».

 

 

Assistant Professor, Department of Strategic and International Management GSOM SPbU, Anastasia Laskovaya spoke in front of the participants of «Archipelago» as a part of its main stage, presenting an accelerating module on analysis of market and consumers for the projects in the realm of AI in the digital economy. Within the lecture the following questions were discussed: 

• why to analyze market;
• how to assess market potential;
• which competitors exist;
• who belongs to target audience;
• how to allocate customer segments;
• how to formulate a value proposition. 

 

Essentially, participants of the accelerator were offered a ready algorithm of proceeding, following which should help startuppers to make an informed choice of a niche on a market and develop a primary development strategy, tentatively realizing whether their projects are actually needed on a market?

 

Participants have accomplished three practical tasks, thanks to which, as Anastasia Laskovaya highlights, «teams were left with artifacts about their projects — data on market size of TAM (total addressable market), SAM (served available market), SOM (served obtainable market), as well as description of competitors, target audience, client segments and value proposition». 

 

As the author of the lecture tells, the described algorithm applies to any business that has clients: «Analysis tools are completely universal. Even if it is a micro-business, market analysis will help to understand the number of potential clients and growth opportunities in a chosen niche». Answering a question about taking into account national characteristics of markets, Anastasia Laskovaya explained: «For this methodology, market specificity is considered in the process of applying the instrument. If we analyze Russian market, then we look only at it, which trends and purchasing habits it has. If we poll Russian consumers, then we talk about their problems and needs. The methodology of market assessment came from Silicon Valley, but for a long time was tested within Russian realities by many startups».  

 

As for "most frequently asked questions": Anastasia Laskovaya mentions that questions on sources of information are some of them — where to search for concrete figures related to the market? "Moreover, many are scared of the fact that at the beginning it is needed to focus only on the most attractive segment and choose which exactly consumers to serve. Especially during crisis entrepreneurs want to serve all clients, not dividing them into different segments", — she points out. 

 

The Assistant Professor was happy about the number of projects in the field of education among the lecture participants. Such tendency for today: "Overall, there is now a clear trend of growth popularity of EdTech startups worldwide, recent largest investment transactions were made into educational solutions and products. which makes complete sense, as the market is being restructured and approach to education is changing towards distant formats».  

 

Organizators of Archipelago 20.35 were University 20.35, NTI Platform, Agency for Strategic Initiatives, Innovation Assistance Foundation and Skolkovo Foundation. As a task there was a creation of effective resource (personnel, project, technological and ecosystem) basis for implementation of National Development Strategy of Artificial Intelligence until 2030, of the programme "Russian digital economy", of the federal project Artificial Intelligence, and also road maps of National Technology Initiative. 

 

Archipelago 20.35 was held from September 27 to November 21. All program was conducted online.